


Weblum Report

by Cutekittenlady



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: F/M, Locxa - Freeform, Post weblum episode, acxa has a bad history with high command, lotors not straightforward with his feelings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-19
Updated: 2018-03-19
Packaged: 2019-04-04 15:08:24
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,384
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14022897
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Cutekittenlady/pseuds/Cutekittenlady
Summary: After the mission in the weblum, Acxa gives her report.





	Weblum Report

“Have you received an update from Acxa yet?”

Ezor had to repress a groan of irritation.

“No, sir.” she responded n as controlled a tone as she could muster. 

_ Not since you asked me that just a varga ago. _

Not that she could blame the prince for being antsy. Acxa was supposed to have reported in days ago after retrieving the scaultrite. It was possible she had just been held up or even forgotten (as unlikely a that was for the ever studious Acxa) to send a message.

Besides, Weblums weren't exactly fuzzy space caterpillars. Just flying near one was dangerous enough without actively trying to enter its body. Even if Acxa had managed to locate the weblum, it may have taken her longer than expected to get the scaultrite.

Or she got eaten. The entered Ezors head before she could squelch it.

A part of her blamed Lotor for Acxa’s long absence. They could have just continued monitoring the black market for the damn things but Lotor just HAD to mention how the Alteans had harvested the scaultrite causing zethrid to want to try her hands at “conquering” the weblum. So of course acxa had explained the dangers and went and volunteered to go and collect the damn things.

To his credit Lotor HAD explained, to the fullest of his knowledge, how dangerous the endeavor was. Especially since they lacked any back up. Lotor was still in exile and couldn't exactly ask his dear old dad to pretty please come and bust his subordinate out of the belly of a living recycle center.

Acxa had insisted. They couldn’t just wait around for a rare and almost unknown artifact to show up at the local second hand shop. The sooner they got the scaultrite the sooner Lotor’s plans could move ahead.

Lotor had eventually been forced to concede and gave Acxa the location of a known Weblum. He’d taken his own sweet time detailing all the dangers and reminding Acxa of what they were need to do next upon her return. She had paid rapt attention and promised her success before departing.

That was the last any of them had seen or heard from her in over a week.

Zethrid had voiced her concerns almost immediately afterwards. How she was the strongest of the five and would have wrestled the best into submission.

“It is bigger than a galran battle cruiser.” Lotor had explained amusedly. “Besides I’d much rather we not harm the beast if at all possible. I have enough enemies without adding a giant planet eater to the list, thank you.”

Narti had voiced her concern next. Or insofar as her limited means of communication would allow. But Lotor shot her down as well.

“I’m afraid that the open belly of a weblum is not a safe place for Kova. Any means to protect him in that environment would limit his mobility. And yours by extension.”

Finally when Ezor tried to demand why he hadn’t sent her into the weblum Lotor had just smiled at her politely as a knowing look passed between them. Acxa was a better pilot and they both knew it.

Of course none of them bothered to ask Lotor why he hadn’t gone. It wasn’t that the idea had not occurred to him but when he and Acxa had been discussing things there was something about how she straightened her shoulders and narrowed her eyes that somehow guaranteed the matter would not be raised.

Ezor wondered about those two sometimes. More specifically she wondered about Acxa’s dedication to Lotor. 

On the prince’s part, he didn’t seem to treat or view Acxa any differently than the rest of them. Acxa, however, seemed to curt and tail to Lotor in a way uncharactic of how she usually interacted with higher ranking officials.

As the last person to join the group, Ezor had little to no idea how Acxa or any of the others met and ended up working under Lotor. Any attempts she made to find out in the beginning tended to get swept aside in the face of her bosses fast paced work schedule. And while she was sure she could get a straight answer from Zethrid for how she’d ended up here there was no way Narti, Acxa, or Lotor were going to wax nostalgic about something that was already said and done with. 

Besides it wasn’t like any of them had a reason to tell her outside of satiating her curiosity so it was best to just leave the matter to itself.

The sound of a message coming in dragged Ezor out of her thoughts.

“We’ve gotten a transmission!” She said excitedly.

She heard the sound of a sharp intake of breath from behind her but didn’t bother turning her head to see who it was. Considering Narti and Zethrid were both at their own councils to her left and right that left only one person via process of elimination.

To Lotor’s credit, years of practiced control helped to keep most of the anticipation out of his voice. Most of it, that is.

“Is it a report from Acxa?”

She skimmed through the message.

“Yep, she says she needs to be picked up.”

Zethrid frowned. “Didn’t she have a ship? Why doesn't she just come back herself?”

Ezor shrugged and hummed an “I dunno.”

Lotor was silent for a minute before turning to Narti.

“Run a check on the coding.”

“What for?” Ezor asked deflating a little in her excitement.

“Acxa left with a ship with a fully functioning communication set up. And yet she sends us a typed message, with no video feed, requesting us to extract her?”

“Maybe the ships comms are just broken.”

“Or perhaps Acxa had a bit more trouble than expected.” Lotor looked over the data being processed. “Before she left I told her to slip a code into any messages she sent. It would guarantee the message is genuine and hadn’t been tampered with. Or that she had not been forced to send a false one. So if the code isn’t there-”

He stopped and stared at the results.

The other three held their breaths.

Lotor breathed in and gave a sigh of relief. 

“Nevermind. The code has been included.” He turned to return to his chair. “Set a course to intercept with the coordinates the message provides.”

Normally Ezor would have teased the prince about his concern, but she was too happy at the prospect of having Acxa back to care much.

* * *

 

Acxa wasn’t sure how long she’d been there.

With her ship gone, she’d been left adrift in space with only her jets to propel her forward through the void. Thankfully, the weblum had left a lot of debris in its wake allowing her to tether herself to a convenient piece of rock and await extraction.

As she waited, the bag of scaultrite tied securely to her waist, Acxa went over what she would tell Prince Lotor about her missions.

Things… hadn’t gone as planned.

For starters, instead of tethering her ship to the beast and entering through one of its glands, she had instead found herself swallowed up. Ship and all.

To make matters worse the cockpit doors had been sealed shut by parts of the mighty creatures digestive system, preventing her from properly ejecting or extracting her craft.

Then there had been those strangers who’d shown up. Also looking for scaultrite as it were.

She’d managed to snatch up a bag before escaping, but… Acxa didn’t feel satisfied. In fact, she felt downright miserable.

Even if she had technically succeeded in getting scaultrite from the weblum, it was only a single bag. Though Lotor had simply told her to get ‘enough’, the measly return didn’t feel quite like enough to Acxa’s judgement. For all she knew, the strangers had been wrong and the hard discs weren’t even actually scaultrite but some other byproduct.

Then of course there was the ship. Prince Lotor wasn’t exactly drowning in resources, so losing something as essentially as a spare ship may set him back months. Maybe even years.

Worst of all she’d actually been forced to call for help.

Even if Lotor had given her the code to include in case of a distressful situation like the one she was in, Acxa didn’t feel happy using it. It felt too much like admitting to failure.

In the past, failure had not been a pleasant experience for her. Her commanding officers in the past had always punished her severely when she failed. She’d been delegated undesirable and dangerous positions, deprived of her rations, and in at least one case, turned out of her barracks and forced to sleep in the cargo hold.

Eventually she’d found herself unable to find anyone who was willing to take her on as a crewman.

Except, of course, for Prince Lotor.

_ He is certain to be furious with me. _ She told herself.  _ Making them go out of their way to retrieve me. I’ll be lucky if they don’t ignore the message and leave me out here. _

Her fears, however, were unfounded. In just a few more vargas, the ship arrived amongst the stranded debris, and Acxa was retrieved.

The dog pile of Zethrid, Ezor, and, to a much less extent, Narti wasn’t expected but also not entirely unwelcome. Then she caught sight of Lotor. He was a respectable distance away, with the most neutral position she’d ever seen.

He didn’t say anything, instead allowing the others to interrogate her on what had occurred and after Acxa had given a rough explanation, stopping once or twice to answer a sudden question, only then did he interrupt.

“I think, it's about time you all went back to to your stations. It won’t do to remain in open space all of the day.”

But just as Acxa was about to slink away to her console, happy to have avoided any kind of lecture, Lotor stopped her.

“Not you, Acxa.” He spoke sternly. “I want to hear a full report from you. In private.”

Acxa’s mouth went dry as a knot formed in her stomach.

“Yes, sir.” she managed as she followed him. Only catching a glance of the other girls watching them go with anxious faces before the door closed behind them.

The report was… not as unpleasant as she’d expected. She’d stopped several times expecting Lotor to question jus why she’d managed to let things go so wrong, only to have him encourage her to continue. When she’d finished, Lotor stood silently deep in thought.

After some time, Acxa felt compelled to speak.

“Sir?”

“Hm?” Lotor snapped out of his thought and looked at her. “Ah, yes… Now, I just want to make sure I have this straight.”

Acxa squared her shoulders and prepared herself.

“You said someone came and let you out?”

“Yes, sir. Two of them.”

“Did you recognize them? I mean to say, could you identify their affiliation?”

“Sir?”

“Were they galra? Rebels?”

Here she was forced to pause.

“I’m… not certain sir. They most certainly weren’t galra. But I also don’t think they were rebels.”

“What makes you say that?”

“They didn’t kill me on sight, sir.”

Lotor paused and smiled at this. “Yes. Very true.”

“There was,” Acxa hesitated. “One other thing sir.”

The prince looked at her inquiringly.

“They spoke to each other sir. In front of me. Quite openly.”

“Really?” he tilted his head in interest.

“They…” she hesitated again. He’d handled everything up until this point quite well. 

The loss of the ship was a calculated risk, he’d said. The amount of scaultrite she’d recovered had been more than he’d actually expected. Even her distress signal he’d praised as being level headed and careful.

But if she carried on with her report, Acxa feared Lotor would become angry with her. 

Angry for not shooting both the intruders down when she had the chance. Angry that she hadn’t nipped a grave danger in the bud. Angry that she’d failed in her duty as a soldier in service to her prince.

But a report was a report. If she left this out, she knew Lotor would just find out about it later. And then he really would be angry.

“They said they were paladins of Voltron, Prince Lotor.”

She then shut her mouth and awaited his response.

Lotor stood and stared at her.

The unreadable expression was back on his face, though, this time Acxa noted the peculiar way his mouth sat agape and the way his eyes widened slightly.

He didn’t respond right away. Instead he took a few moments to regain bearings before asking, “You are… certain of this?”

“Yes sir.”

“They introduced themselves to you as such?”

“N-No sir. I did not speak to them myself. They mentioned it to one another while I was present. I don’t think they realized my frequency was synced with theirs.”

“I see…” 

Then, much to Acxa’s surprise a devious smile grew on the prince’s face. 

“Is everything alright sir?”

“Everything is quite well, Acxa. Quite well. You’ve really outdone yourself today.” He gave her a congratulatory look. “You retrieved the scaultrite and delivered an invaluable piece of information. I must say, I am impressed.”

Acxa wasn’t sure how to react. She’d been expecting at least some light scolding, not such bright praise.

“I… thank you sir.”

“You can go now, if you wish. Go rest for awhile. You’ve more than earned it.”

“But… but sir-”

“The others and I will take care of things while you recuperate. Going through a weblums digestive track isn’t exactly a trip to the mall. When I need you again, I’ll send one of the others to fetch you. Is that clear?”

“Absolutely sir.” She nodded and saluted respectfully before turning to go. “Thank you sir.”

But just as she was about to retire to her quarters, the prince’s voice called after her.

“And… Acxa?”

She paused and turned back. “Yes, Prince Lotor.”

Lotor hesitated for a moment. Carefully picking his words.

“I… am very pleased to have you return safely.”

Acxa stared at him in surprise.

Lotor turned away from her and back to his own screen. 

“That is all.”

She couldn’t stop the grateful smile or the grateful blush that dusted her cheeks.

“Thank you Lotor.”


End file.
